What the Heck is “Trail Rated”? This Where Jeep Gets its Off Road Chops!
The Lyman Trail is where Jeep proves its capability so you know what this baby can do.
You’ve seen it on the sides of Jeeps for a while: a Trail Rated badge announces the capability and bravado of the Jeep brand. Not all Jeep models are trail rated, though all are capable on most on the trails that they may come across.
But how does Jeep know if a vehicle is capable of driving through water, mud, and gravel? And in deep snow, on steep hills and badly rutted roads? And how do they know that each improvement or evolution of a part or process will meet the demands of Hell’s Gate or the Rubicon Trail? We took it off road to find out.
To test out each new development, they have their own off-road test trail at the Chelsea Proving Grounds in Chelsea, Michigan to be sure it is worthy of pursuing further. From there each vehicle tests in other places, but this is where it starts.
Once a new design is approved, engineers take it out to the proving ground and test it against the criteria that it’ll face in the real world. We got a chance to drive this trail and test out the well-proven Jeep Wrangler on the trails that Jeep uses to challenge each feature on their four-wheel-drive systems.
Here are the challenges that Jeep puts its vehicles through to ensure they are worthy of what being labeled “Trail Rated.”
While off-roading you probably want to listen to the sounds of the forest, the splashing of the mud and the rocks as your Jeep crushes them. You should also listen to your Jeep to know that the engine, transmission, suspension, and scrape plates are doing their job. But getting to and from the trail, you need a good soundtrack. This is what we listened to in the Jeep Wrangler.
Journalist, entrepreneur and mom. Expertise includes new cars, family cars, 3-row SUVs, child passenger car seats and automotive careers and culture. A World Car Awards juror and member of the steering committee, Scotty likes to say the automotive business found her, rather than her finding it. But recognizing the opportunity to give voice to powerful female consumers and create a voice to match their spending power, her mission became to empower women as car buyers and owners. A career-long journalist, she has written for the New York Times, Town & Country, Adweek and co-authored the book Stew Leonard, My Story, a biography of the founder of the iconic grocery company Stew Leonard’s. Her love of cars started when her father insisted she learn to change the oil in her MG Midget, but now it mostly plays out in the many road trips taken with her family.